Motorola: Moto X is not competing with the Nexus 5

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"How is the Moto X different to the cheaper Nexus 5?" is the question that we found ourselves asking as soon as we heard Motorola's flagship phone was coming to the UK. It was, therefore, something we put to Motorola's James Soames our our interview with him at the Moto X launch event.The answer wasn't evasive, it was simply that Motorola doesn't see Nexus devices as competing with its hardware.

Perhaps a strange answer, and many high-tech geeks will probably shout "but the Nexus is faster and cheaper than the Moto X" but that's part of the answer. Motorola simply says that the Nexus 5 has a niche audience, it's one for those who buy their phones outright, and it's not widely available outside of the Google's own store, and with a limited number of providers.

So, at least from a business perspective, Motorola's existing distribution and deals with service providers mean that it can get its devices out to a far wider audience. That might all sound boring, but there's a lot of important things going on here that are about distribution and how people pay for phones. Most people, for example, don't pay upfront and want the handset added to the contract cost, which Google doesn't offer with the Nexus, but providers will on the Moto X.

We talked about more than just people's attitudes to phones though, we learnt about how the British accent is a huge part of what Motorola has added to the phone for its UK launch, and we also asked about how much control the company has over Android now Motorola is a Google company.